Jason Victor Serinus

PS Audio was showing a pre-production version of the almost available Power Plant Premier ($2195), paired with the Trio C100 Control amps ($1795), Digital Link 3 DAC ($995), Usher 6311 ($2000), and PS Audio cabling. Most impressive, besides the exceptional depth of presentation, was the computer-generated comparison between the amount of noise eliminated by a $2500 power conditioner and the PS Audio Quintet Power Distribution Center, a passive line conditioner that lists for $695. (The photo shows a member of the PS Audio team gloating over the results). The new power plant, by the way, doubles the output of the old P1000, and offers significantly better efficiency and current output.

Tipped off by Stereophile reader David Goodwin, I recently visited the San Francisco Airport Museum's beautifully thought-out and executed exhibit The History of Audio: The Engineering of Sound. Installed to coincide with the 121st convention of the Audio Engineering Society, held at San Francisco's Moscone Center October 5–8, the exhibit runs through May 2007 in the North Connect Gallery of the airport's Terminal 3 (footnote 1).

Classical music specialist Channel Classics, headquartered in the Netherlands, has begun releasing the first DSD-native, hybrid multichannel SACDs recorded in China. Issued under the Channel of China imprint, the first two titles, Ambush on All Sides (CCS-SA-80106), featuring Zhang Hong Yan on solo pipa, and Soliloquy at Cold Mountain Temple (CCS-SA-80406), with the China National Symphony Orchestra under Li Xin Cao, have recently reached the US. A third SACD, featuring Yu Hong Mei on erhu (CCS-SA-80206), is scheduled to reach European shelves at the end of September and the US three or four months later.

We all know the refrain. Classical music is losing its audience. With shorter attention spans, the ascent of the iPod, a penchant for music (and spoken word masquerading as music) in the background, and the submergence of audio by home theater, fewer and fewer people in the United States are being exposed to art music of the past and present.